Sleepy Studies

DHS student sleeping in class.

The excessive amount of work among students of Duxbury High School has turned them into walking zombies. Jobs, sports, home and schoolwork, and other co-curriculars are taking up all hours of the day. The hallways and classrooms are filled with the slow moving, lethargic students who are struggling to stay awake. Most students can be seen with large coffees in hand, trying to keep themselves awake enough to function on early school day mornings.

Freshman Grace B. is one of the many DHS students who juggle sports and schoolwork. Between basketball and volleyball, and having practice everyday after school for an hour during sports seasons, balancing schoolwork can be hard. “I won’t be able to start my work until after dinner which is around seven o’clock,” said Grace, and it takes her about three hours to complete all of her work. This means that the work does not end until ten o’clock at night. Many of the DHS students play multiple sports and have to do their schoolwork around it. Staying up late after practices and games causes considerable sleep loss for student athletes.

Sports are not the only thing keeping students up at night. Co-curriculars that take place after school, such as clubs like Drama, Best Buddies, GSA, Link Crew, and so many more take up a lot of time. Junior Chris L. said that a lot of his sleep deprivation came from all of the different types of activities. Chris participates in Drama, Global Engagement Club, Student Council, along with having a job at Benchwarmers. Going to sleep around one o’clock in the morning is a common thing for him. Chris said, “the night before tests I really try to study, but I end up falling asleep.” Sophomore Owen M. has also noticed how busy a lot of the students are. Owen said, “one of my friends does rowing and robotics so he barely has any free time.” Owen finds himself losing sleep over big projects and doing notecards for research papers.

Sleepfoundation.org mentions how high school students, “are like zombies getting ready for school and find it hard to be alert and pay attention in class. Due to sleep deprivation they are sleepy all day and cannot do their best. Webmd.com backs up this idea in saying that lack of sleep causes problems in paying attention, problem solving, and reasoning. This makes it harder for students to learn and retain the lessons. Not only does lack of sleep affect humans mentally, but physically as well. According to Webmd.com, common signs are “puffy eyes, pale skin, and dark circles under the eyes.” There is no actual way for the human body to adjust to running despite how many people believe that they can.

Senior Madeline B. has adjusted her days to fit around all of the activities she does, as she said, “I have gotten into a habit that if I don’t get eight hours of sleep a night, I’m exhausted.” Full orchestra, philosophy club, knitting club, Girl Scouts, and teaching lessons has kept Madeline busy everyday after school. Despite all of these co-curriculars, getting enough sleep is not a problem. Madeline has, however, heard a lot of people talking about the lack of sleep they get.